Radio Live - Podcasts - Keen On America - Big Brother Down Under: Is it 1984 Already in Australia?

Big Brother Down Under: Is it 1984 Already in Australia?

Author: Andrew Keen December 14, 2025 Duration: 37:31

Big Brother Down Under: Is it 1984 Already in Australia?

Podcast episode

Big Brother Down Under: Is it 1984 Already in Australia?

Keen On America

Society Commentary Culture News

Keen On America is a sharp, fast-moving podcast hosted by author and commentator Andrew Keen. Known for asking impertinent questions, Keen cross-examines some of the world’s most thoughtful voices on politics, economics, history, culture, the environment, and technology. Each episode digs beneath headlines and hype to uncover what is really shaping America today and how those forces connect to global change. Listeners can expect challenging conversations rather than easy talking points, as Keen presses guests to explain not just what is happening, but why it matters and what might come next. Whether you are trying to make sense of polarized politics, rapid technological disruption, or shifting social norms, this show offers a bracing, critical lens. Tune in and listen episodes of Keen On America to hear Andrew Keen interrogate the ideas and assumptions that define contemporary American life.

It’s been quite a week in tech. The Australian social media ban, the Netflix vs Paramount fight over Warner Bros & the Disney-OpenAI deal. That Was The Week’s Keith Teare and I try to explain all this in the broader context of the future of media in 2026 and beyond. Has Australia really gone Orwellian in its teen social media ban, who should own Warner and will movie theaters & serious journalism have a future in the AI age? Our answers aren’t always what you’d expect.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe

More episodes

Episode 2058: Timothy Morton searches for a Christian Ecology that will get us out of our Planetary Hell

Episode 2058: Timothy Morton searches for a Christian Ecology that will get us out of our Planetary Hell

09.05.2024 Duration: 35:26

Timothy Morton, who teaches English at Rice, has become a bit of a rock star interpreter of our hellishly hot planetary times. And his eclectic work has even gotten the stamp of approval of real rock stars - like Laurie…

Episode page

Episode 2057: KEEN ON America featuring R. Derek Black

Episode 2057: KEEN ON America featuring R. Derek Black

08.05.2024 Duration: 54:06

How seriously should we take the white nationalist threat in the United States? Very seriously, at least according to R. Derek Black, a young man who knows a thing or two about the US white nationalist movement. The son…

Episode page

Episode 2056: Kyle Paoletta exposes the 2024 Republican Primaries as "Farce"

Episode 2056: Kyle Paoletta exposes the 2024 Republican Primaries as "Farce"

07.05.2024 Duration: 42:45

Marx’s 19th century remark that history repeats itself twice, first as tragedy and then as farce, helps us makes sense of the seemingly surreal politics of the contemporary Republican Party. As Kyle Paoletta notes in his…

Episode page

Episode 2055: Michael Ignatieff on a history of his privileges

Episode 2055: Michael Ignatieff on a history of his privileges

06.05.2024 Duration: 44:11

Pete Townsend said it best. “Hope I die before I get old” he wrote in The Who’s anthemic 1965 hit, “My Generation”. But what Townsend really meant in a lyric that best captured the rebellious Boomer spirit of the Sixties…

Episode page

Episode 2054: Keith Teare follows the money of the online creative economy

Episode 2054: Keith Teare follows the money of the online creative economy

06.05.2024 Duration: 34:12

The more that changes in the digital world, the more that stays the same. For all the disruption of AI, two trends appear totally unchanging. Firstly, it’s the big players - Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Apple - that app…

Episode page

Episode 2053: Vince Houghton on how the Cold War transformed Miami into America's most Covert City

Episode 2053: Vince Houghton on how the Cold War transformed Miami into America's most Covert City

04.05.2024 Duration: 41:39

We don’t often image Miami as a city of Cold War subterfuge akin to Berlin or Vienna. But according to Vince Houghton, co-author of COVERT CITY, Miami was as crucial to winning the Cold War as Washington DC or Moscow. Th…

Episode page

Episode 2052: Bryan Caplan on the economic and philosophical case for the radical deregulation of the housing industry

Episode 2052: Bryan Caplan on the economic and philosophical case for the radical deregulation of the housing industry

03.05.2024 Duration: 37:54

We’ve done several shows on the housing crisis in America, mostly from a progressive perspective in which the solution to the shortage of homes is presented in terms of government investment. The libertarian economist, B…

Episode page

Episode 2051: Mohamed Amer Meziane offers an ecological and racial history of seculization

Episode 2051: Mohamed Amer Meziane offers an ecological and racial history of seculization

02.05.2024 Duration: 37:35

One of Bethanne Patrick’s recommended books for April was Mohamed Amer Meziane’s The States of the Earth. It sounded intriguing, if not entirely coherent, and so I invited Meziane on the show. Even now, I’m not sure I ex…

Episode page

Episode 250: Andrew J Scott on why we should care about old people

Episode 250: Andrew J Scott on why we should care about old people

02.05.2024 Duration: 38:42

In today’s stultified American gerontocracy, not everyone is convinced that we should care about old people. After all, aging baby boomers still control most of the wealth and power in an increasingly divided & inegalita…

Episode page

Episode 2049: KEEN ON AMERICA featuring Samyr Laine

Episode 2049: KEEN ON AMERICA featuring Samyr Laine

01.05.2024 Duration: 51:24

Samyr Laine might be a model for how to become a Haitian-American in the 21st century. Son of Haitian emigrants, Laine was a roommate of Mark Zuckerberg at Harvard, competed at the London 2012 Olympics as a Haitian tripl…

Episode page

Episode 2048: Tobias Buck on the Holocaust on Trial in the 21st Century

Episode 2048: Tobias Buck on the Holocaust on Trial in the 21st Century

30.04.2024 Duration: 45:13

Given the industry of Holocaust remembering, do we really need another book about the Nazis and their industrial death camps? Yes, according to Tobias Buck, author of the much acclaimed A Final Verdict: the Holocaust on…

Episode page

Episode 2047: Elisa New on Poetry in America

Episode 2047: Elisa New on Poetry in America

29.04.2024 Duration: 39:38

The Harvard academic Elisa New is host of the much acclaimed PBS series POETRY IN AMERICA. Now in Season Four, the show has featured conversations about American poetry with Joe Biden, Herbie Hancock, Gloria Estefan, Sha…

Episode page

Episode 2046: David Faris on why American kids are all left these days

Episode 2046: David Faris on why American kids are all left these days

29.04.2024 Duration: 36:34

In November of this year, two particularly out of touch eighty-year old men will contest the US Presidential election. America, in other words, has an age problem. According to David Faris, author of THE KIDS ARE ALL LEF…

Episode page

Episode 2045: Lisa Kaltenegger on the inevitability of the existence of non-human life somewhere in the Universe

Episode 2045: Lisa Kaltenegger on the inevitability of the existence of non-human life somewhere in the Universe

27.04.2024 Duration: 35:17

As founding director of Cornell University's Carl Sagan Institute and author of the new ALIEN EARTHS: Planet Hunting in the Cosmos, Lisa Kaltenegger is one of the world’s most respected cosmologists. She believes that, w…

Episode page

Episode 2044: Warning! This KEEN ON conversation with Alex Edmans may contain lies

Episode 2044: Warning! This KEEN ON conversation with Alex Edmans may contain lies

27.04.2024 Duration: 31:45

In a “post-truth” world, who should we trust? According to Alex Edmans, one of the UK’s hottest business school professors, you should trust him enough to read his new book, May Contain Lies: How Stories, Statistics and…

Episode page

Logo

Select station

—

VOL